St. George’s about to turn Durban into a ghost town.
Maud Mfusi St. formerly known as St. George’s has had a notably high rate of murders, kidnaps, assaults and other violent crimes. There are major problems facing residents that the municipality and police force cannot handle as some issues are above their abilities and available resources.
Community members of Durban in St. Georges have normalized the lack of service delivery and the crimes they witness everyday. University students located to this street face so many challenges and are always warned to watch their backs. A lot of crimes are witnessed, people get mugged in broad daylight, non-plated cars drive crazy while making kidnaps a norm. Sibekezelo Mvelase a student from DUT who was located to live on this street for his first year said, “People get killed here, when I first moved into this street the first incident I witnessed was of “amaphara” (homelsss crooks) stabbing a man after he refused to give them his belongings.” Said Mvelase. The issue of homeless crooks is the most common in St. George’s.
The amount of dirt the people are living around should affect their health as there is a high number of homeless people who eat, sleep and use the same street for sanitation. Residents flood the street with bottles of alcohol and there is a high rate of crimes that happens around this Lion’s den. Fast and loud cars move around at high speed everyday.
Students living in Maud Mfusi Street stay at high risk of being victims of crime as they are the main target of criminals most especially during the first months of the academic year. When political parties march to get people to vote they normally use St George’s since the street is always busy and there are quite a lot of people who live there. Students who are based on this street have to deal with the level of noises that comes with living in St. George’s and these incidents happen mostly at night; during the time students use to study.
Hoosen Moolla, senior manager of the city’s Inner eThekwini Regenation and Urban Management Programme (iTrump) mentioned how the street has been the one with the highest number of cases investigated on. “Police are always raiding the street of St Georges especially at night but with the unruly community members situations get even bad day by day. We always have people drinking in public, fights and most of the buildings are found with drugs, tenants are overcrowded and some buildings are used illegally as student accommodations where students live in terrible conditions.” Said Moolla.
“It seems useless sometimes as you will find a pile of dirt by midday and sometimes we are forced to work at night because of the amount of mess the residents make on the streets.” Said Mrs. Sizakele Mantashe a cleaner employed by eThekwini municipality. Cleaners work day in and out cleaning the street of Maud Mfusi.
Durban will never be the same again if communities don’t claim the city by taking responsibility for their actions.
